POLITICS FIRST Universities Prometej and Victoria returned to the list of accredited institutions, no indictment yet in the Cluster case

(Patria) - The Agency for Development of Higher Education and Quality Assurance of BiH has returned the College of Applied and Legal Sciences "Prometej" and "VICTORIA INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY" (formerly University of Modern Sciences - CKM Mostar) to the list of accredited higher education institutions in BiH.

These two institutions were removed from the list of accredited institutions at the beginning of March, and as expected, political pressure followed for these institutions to be returned to the list, after which they were issued a so-called supplementary accreditation.

Prometej was first registered in the State Register of Accredited Higher Education Institutions in BiH in 2016 with a validity period of five years. In the meantime, it submitted a request for reaccreditation and in 2021 received a new decision for certain study programs. Although both of these higher education institutions submitted a request for renewed reaccreditation, as confirmed for Patria, the requests were incomplete and untimely. A member of the Management of Prometej is related to Nebojša Radmanović, an SNSD cadre.

According to the decision made by the Agency for Development of Higher Education and Quality Assurance of BiH on June 3, 2024, and based on the Decision of the Agency for Higher Education of RS, Prometej's deadline for completing the accreditation procedure has been extended until October 19, 2024, at the latest.

CKM, or rather VICTORIA International University, was registered in the State Register in 2020 with a validity period of four years. According to the Agency's decision of May 23, 2024, and acting on the decision of the Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sports of HNK, the validity of the institutional accreditation has been extended until the completion of the reaccreditation procedure.

Incidentally, both of these institutions are covered by the "Cluster" operation, which was carried out by the BiH Prosecutor's Office in February 2023 with the help of SIPA, whose undercover investigators obtained multiple diplomas from higher education institutions for money, without ever having studied.

The investigation included several universities, faculties, and colleges, and the operation was conducted throughout 2023, and even during 2024. A large amount of money was seized during the searches, which is suspected to originate from the sale of diplomas.

However, there is still no indictment, and there are a number of suspects in this case.

The Cluster operation included private universities in Brčko, Banja Luka, Travnik, and Mostar. They were mostly accredited in 2020 and 2021, and the commissions included professors, two of whom later became members of the Management Board of the Agency for Development of Higher Education and Quality Assurance, and one is even the owner of two universities under investigation.

As reported in the media, the investigation included deans and other employees of higher education institutions Zoran Kalinić, Vaso Pajić, Vladimir Stojanović, Vojislav Škrbić, Denis Pračić, Dragan Ilić, Goran Lalović, Dušan Perić, Ljubiša Todorović. Among the higher education institutions are the Independent University of Banja Luka (NUBL), the University of Business Studies (UPS) Banja Luka, the College of Applied and Legal Sciences "Prometej" Banja Luka, the Pan-European University "Apeiron" and the University of Business Engineering and Management (PIM) Banja Luka, the University of Travnik and the International University Travnik, the newly formed Victoria International University from Mostar, created in 2023 by the merger of the University of Modern Sciences CKM Mostar and the College "Union" Mostar, and from Brčko District the European University.

Incidentally, on April 17, the mandate of seven members of the Agency's Management Board expired, and the competition for the election of new members has not yet been announced. New members are confirmed by the Parliamentary Assembly of BiH for a term of three years with the possibility of re-election.